


Bedrest

by renecdote



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Comfort, Fluff, Multi, Pre-Relationship, bruce is high p much the whole time, for once no hurt, go me, happy birthday jegan, hope this sacrificial fluff offering satisfies you, it's really just sappy nonsense, look I don't even know, sleeping, very brief cameo by nado, well it's implied but whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 18:29:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18722557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renecdote/pseuds/renecdote
Summary: Bruce sleeps a lot. Clark and Diana laugh at him a lot.Oh and they're all sappy friends lowkey in love with each other. They'll figure it out.





	Bedrest

**Author's Note:**

> Super belated happy birthday Megan. I wrote pure fluff for you are you proud?

 

"This is stupid," Bruce grumbles. He shifts uncomfortably on the bed, lifting one hand to rub at eyes that feel dry and scratchy. 

Diana tucks the blanket more firmly around his waist. "It's not stupid, Bruce," she says, "you have a broken leg and three fractured ribs. You couldn't walk right now even if you wanted to."

Bruce frowns at her. His mind is fuzzy from painkillers. Why is she going on about his broken leg? He can barely feel it. "Not that," he says, because bed rest is an inconvenience but he knows if he tried to walk right now it would just be embarrassing. "This movie makes no sense. The transition between New York and the forest was too… clunky.”

Clark laughs. "That's because-"

Diana shoots him a look and he shuts his mouth. Then she turns her kind smile on Bruce. "Bruce, what is it you think we're watching?"

Bruce has to think about that. Really think about it. He can't remember the last time he really thought about something... Isn't he just supposed to know things? People get annoyed at him about that all the time. 

After a long moment of thought Bruce confidently says, "Who framed Roger Rabbit?"

There'd been real people on the screen but now there are cartoon animals bouncing around. It's the only explanation.

Clark laughs again. A short, hastily stifled sound that makes Bruce look at him sharply. He has to look a long way up to see Clark's face. That perfect jaw smiling down at him, eyes that sparkle in the sunlight shining through a gap in the curtains, one perfect curl dropping over his forehead. Bruce has a sudden urge to pull that curl. He wants to feel the soft strands of hair between his fingers, watch them spring back up like a rubber band after he lets go. But Clark's face is so far up...

"Did you get taller?" Bruce asks. Clark answers with more stifled laughter and words that don't make it to Bruce's brain after they reach his ears. His thoughts are too distracted by wonderings about how tall Superman can grow. Is this it? Or is Clark just going to keep getting taller? Would it be different if he lived under a red sun rather than a yellow one?

"Bruce."

He opens his eyes and Diana's face are right in front of him. Her fingers are warm against the side of Bruce's jaw. Clark is warm too, shoulder holding up Bruce's traitorous head which leaned over there without his permission. The Gray Ghost is chasing down criminals on the TV. Something explodes and it makes Bruce’s vision spark, his head throb. 

"Hey," he says and it comes out raspy, paper thin. He has to clear his throat to speak agin. "What are you two doing in my bedroom?"

Diana's teeth are perfectly straight, so shiny she should be the face of a toothpaste brand. They're still smiling at Bruce, so gentle and caring. "Alfred let us in," she says. 

Oh. That's okay. If Alfred let them in, they must be meant to be here. Instead of... instead of.... Where else would they be? Bruce should know this, Clark and Diana aren't always by his side. They're usually never by his side in bed. Much as he may wish otherwise...

Bruce blinks and Diana isn't in front of him anymore. He's warm all over, almost too warm, tucked between two superhuman furnaces. He tries to pull away and they crowd closer, keeping him in bed. Hair tickles Bruce's ear on one side and his arm on the other. He frowns. What the hell are Clark and Diana doing in his bedroom?

What the hell are they doing in his _bed_?

On the TV, the weather reporter is gesturing to heavy rains moving across the state. Bruce sits up and pain steals his breath. Ow. Painkillers must be wearing off. The pain sharpens his mind though, clears some of the fuzz. He vaguely remembers talking to Clark and Diana, watching some movie that he couldn't make heads nor tails of.

And that sharpens his mind even more. A coin being flipped in the air, Two-Face grinning, the floor giving way beneath him—

Shit. Harvey. Bruce reaches for the covers to throw them aside, trying to figure out how he's going to sneak out from between Clark and Diana. An arm snakes around his waist to stop him.

"Don't move," Clark says, voice rough like he's just woken up. 

Bruce grunts. "Don't tell me what to do."

"I'm just the messenger," Clark says. There's a triumphant smile in his voice. "They're Alfred's orders."

Damn. Bruce leans back against the pillows. 

"Smart decision," Diana says. Her hair is messy when she rolls her neck to look up at Bruce, but she still looks as beautiful as ever. "Are you properly with us this time?"

"Where else would I be?" Bruce asks. Then he cringes. There’s no way that didn’t sound like he’s madly in love with his best friends. That he doesn’t daydream about waking up like this, both of them here, smiling at him, smiling just for him.

“You kept waking up and asking why were were here,” Clark says. “You don’t remember? We tried to leave to let you get some proper rest but you tried to hobble after us, we had to get in the bed to keep you here.”

Bruce definitely doesn’t remember that. He clears his throat, hoping the blush across his cheeks isn’t noticeable. “Sorry. I was… not in my right mind. You can go now.”

They’re both looking at him very seriously all of a sudden. Too seriously for Bruce’s tired mind and aching bones. He shifts again, limbs feeling heavy, more sore with every waking moment. Diana takes his hand, gentle fingers ghosting over calloused scars, somehow both distracting and grounding at the same time. Now, Bruce thinks, now would be the time to slip back into medicated oblivion, slip out of this moment and into the next before Clark or Diana can say whatever sappy thing his heart desperately wants to hear.

But alas. 

“Do you want us to go?” Diana asks. 

“Of course he doesn’t,” Clark says. Diana shoots him a kryptonite-sharp gaze and he holds up his hands in half-hearted surrender. “Well it’s true, Di. You know how he is about expressing emotions.”

“I’m right here,” Bruce grumbles, then immediately regrets it when their focus shifts back to him.

“Sorry, Bruce.” Clark looks genuinely apologetic. “You can’t say I’m wrong though.”

Bruce grunts. He has a half a mind to be extra expressive with his emotions just to spite Clark. That’d show him…

…just how many emotions Bruce has regarding him and Diana. Hm. Maybe not then. 

“You can stay,” he says, like it’s a gesture of good will, trying not to pay too much attention to the smiles breaking out on Clark and Diana’s faces. If he looks at them too much, absorbs all that joy they’re projecting, he might do something embarrassing like smile back. Or blurt out how gorgeous they are. 

Clark and Diana pull him back down under the covers, Diana’s head on his shoulder, Clark’s leg sliding against his uninjured one. Bruce lies there stiffly, pretending the news story about the world’s largest litter of puppies—“right here in Metropolis!”—playing on the TV is the most interesting thing he’s ever seen. Slowly, almost against his will, he finds himself relaxing, leaning into Clark, not protesting the bangled arm that sneaks across his waist. It’s not the sudden, slippery slide into unconsciousness from earlier, but the gentle, drooping slump of one who is warm and content.

When Bruce wakes sometime later—between the grey hours of dusk and dawn—Clark and Diana are still there. In the blotchy darkness, he smiles. 

Tomorrow, they will wake up together and he won’t ask them to stay, but that’s okay because he doesn’t have to. They know. Bruce thinks that maybe they have always known. 

It suddenly doesn’t seem as scary as it did a few hours ago, Clark and Diana knowing how he feels about them. It’s almost a relief, really. After all, Clark was right, Bruce really isn’t good at articulating his emotions. If they waited for him, they’d be waiting forever. And Bruce doesn’t want to wait forever—not when he already has it, right here, right now, hopefully just the start of many nights, many mornings, waking up with Clark and Diana on either side.

**Author's Note:**

> ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


End file.
